Early Summer Evening At The Farm

Hello dear friends, this evening some of the sheep were fretting so I went for a walk to see what was amiss.  I thought that perhaps our newest lamb had been separated from her mother so while I was walking around the fields I took some photos.

We have had some challenges with the weather of late.  Very warm temperatures, drying winds and very little rainfall have stressed the farm.  The water level in Lake Ophelia is down at least 2 feet and the bullrushes are becoming invasive.  In my walk I did however spot this very handsome frog!

And it took a bit of careful observation but I did spot a number of pink water lilies.  I did not see any sign of the yellow lilies that we had in the past.

The bullrushes have been growing aggressively.  They naturally help to trap sediment and clear the water and also provide natural cover for the goldfish and frogs that live in the pond.  You can see how low the water level is.

 There was still no sign of the missing lamb but this one agreed to be photographed.

This is our newest hay field which was seeded last fall.  It looks good, we should be able to cut and bale next week.

This is crab apple grove.  The pasture is this area is struggling and really needs some rain to help it recover.  Fortunately our sheep have access to other pasture across the road which they can graze for a few hours per day.  As those fields back onto a river and are surrounded by hills they provide a great habitat for coyotes.  Sheep have many predators and coyotes are a problem in our area.

We read an article which suggested that it is good practice to build piles of shrubbery and twigs to provide habitat for wildlife.  As we have a large property we made a pile from fallen tree branches and some old junipers that we cut down.  As I approached the pile I could hear lots of rustling...

And this little fellow popped out!  

The sheep like to spend time between grazing resting under these apple trees.  We have many old and gnarled apple trees on the property.

And in case you were wondering I later saw the ewe with her little lamb so all is well.

~Thank you for visiting!~

Early Morning

Hello dear friends, I have been rather absent of late not because we havent been working on anything...but because nothing has progressed far enough to be able to properly share with you!  For those of you that are curious though I thought I would pop by with some quick photos from early this morning.

I stepped out this morning to see what Willow was up to and why it always takes her so long to come back from her early morning stroll and the light shining onto the deck was glorious.  In the few minutes it took to get my camera though the time had already passed.

I think every gardener has at least one of these nameless pink peonies.

This peony is almost a neon pink.  It is a shock of colour that stands out even at the road!  I am disappointed though that my camera is not taking photos true to colour...perhaps I need to re-examine the settings.

The sheep are out for their morning stroll.  We had a surprise lamb born on the weekend I will try to get photos of her this week.

Here is a project to report on.  We are adding one more deck to the side of the house that will connect to the gazebo.  It will also solve a rather tricky fix that we need to do with the grading around the house.  

There is the little gazebo in the background.  We hope to have this done before the weekend before we host a little dinner for friends.

In a previous post I had mentioned that Emerald Ash Borer has now been discovered in our area.  This Autumn Ash was planted several years ago and we just noticed that the crown of the tree is noticeably more bare on one side.  At first I thought that the tree was just slow to bud out this year but now that we are watching it carefully we fear that we may now have the ash borer on our farm.  Although this is our largest ash tree our farm lane is lined on both sides with ash trees. Sadly it will just be a matter of time before we lose them.

This is a very pretty little perennial geranium.  The blue variety freely self sows absolutely everywhere but this one little plant is very self contained and doesnt even spread.  I wish it would!

I just noticed this pink columbine in a weedy section of one of the gardens.  I wonder where it came from?

These irises are actually purple.

And this columbine is also purple.  I really need to find out what happened to the colours!

~thank you for visiting!~

Sunday Morning Stroll

Good morning dear readers, we have had several days of oppressive heat here in Southern Ontario with no real relief in sight until the end of next week.  Here at the farm the ground is quite dry and we could really use a good drenching of rain. So I thought I would take you with me on a little tour early this morning before it gets too warm.

At this time of year the garden seems to change daily.  The allium are now in full bloom.

This very old honeysuckle was here when we bought the farm.  The blooms are just starting to open and look...there is a pollinator!  A project this year is to plant more flowers to attract pollinating insects and I must of course learn more about all of the different types of pollinators.

Here is a bee checking all of the buds on a peony.

Another bee on a centaurea montana.  I love the electric blue of this plant but having planted it I find it a challenge to control its marauding behaviour.  Once established it is quite hard to get rid of.  I did read that bees are very fond of it so I suppose it must stay!

Here is  a view of the back of the farmhouse on my way to Lake Ophelia. The second floor balcony off the master bedroom is a lovely spot for an early breakfast or pre-dinner glass of wine.  During the day it is too hot and sunny to use as a seating area.  Fortunately we have many seating areas including the covered deck just off the kitchen.

Lake Ophelia is really a pond named after one of our many dogs,  This pond is home to a large number of frogs and as I walked around the pond I could here them jumping into the water but I couldn't find one to photograph.  The pond is also home to a large number of gold fish and receives a lot of bird visitors including a heron.

This pink water lilies were a gift from a neighbouring farm.  

Our farm provides habitat for many varieties of birds.  I spotted this one on my walk and believe it is an Eastern Kingfisher.  

Coming back towards to barn I noticed our white lilac in bloom.  We have two very larges ones that will need to be tackled to bring them into shape.  Several years ago they were nibbled on by our pygmy goats Bob and Bert and ever since they have always looked a little wild.

The sheep and lambs were not in the mood for picture taking today.  The heat is uncomfortable for them so they spend much of their day in the barn where they can enjoy the shade and breezes coming through the open doors.

I dont think the chickens enjoy this heat either.  These two ladies are laying their eggs for the day.

On the way back to the house admiring the fences going down our farm lane.  For the last couple of summers this view has been hidden by mountains of dirt that had been excavated for an addition to our old stone house.  Much of this dirt was used this week to regrade an area around the house.  We still have a mountain or two to move!

I hope you enjoyed this quick little tour and now I will be spending the rest of today in the house with the dogs escaping the heat.  Thank you for visiting!

May Stay-cation!

Good morning everyone I am popping in with some quick photos.  We are at home this week working on various outdoor projects-more on that later!

I believe we have solved the mystery of the twig nests....it is a wren!

I am not sure why this nest is being built so close to our gazebo and house.  With 3 dogs and 4 cats I would have thought it would have selected a location further away.

Our new laying birds are comfortable in the hen house and have figured out the nesting boxes.  We are now getting 15 eggs per day.

During the day we open the little trap door so they can come outside and enjoy some fresh air and sunshine.

The crab apple in Bailey's Garden was a profusion of pink blossoms.  The entire tree was buzzing with pollinator activity.  Two days later and most of the blossoms are now on the ground.

This lamium came from a neighbouring farm.  We also have a white variety.

A variety of allium but now I dont recall which one.  

Last year this white crab apple was just covered with blossoms.  This year we only have a handful of flowers.

A little toad visitor to our waterfall pond.  More on that later as I am still working on it!

Our little garden privvy has been liberated from the last piles of left over construction materials.  I will need to do some creative staring to come up with a plan for this area.

~Thank you for visiting!~

Springtime

Hello everyone, even though we had hail and snow this weekend I am an optimist and believe that spring is here for good!  I love this time of year when everything is so fresh and filled with promise.

Rain drops on a crab apple tree.

I love photographing this lantern.  Perhaps this year we will finally get it re-installed.  It used to be one of a pair at the end of our driveway but we needed to move them for our contractors.  Right now it is just resting against a fence.

Early morning light on maple keys.

This crab apple in Bailey's Garden is just bursting with buds.  From a distance the tree has a burgundy haze to it.

I have not planted any tulips in about 3 years but have some that reliably return...even coming up from left over construction debris.  I like to order my spring bulbs from Veseys and this year will order fresh bulbs for the gardens.  As none of the colours match I believe that these are part of the naturalizing collection I planted.

This is exciting!  Our first egg from our new collection of chickens.  For those that visit our farm blog you may recall that a weasel entered our hen house and killed several of our laying hens.  Then after moving the surviving chickens into the barn a mink scaled the fence to enter their area and killed the rest of them.  As a result for the first time in many years I have been buying eggs at the grocery store.  I dont know if it is very scientific but I do believe that freshly laid eggs from our own hens are the best!

Next week we will be enjoying a little vacation on the farm and will be using the week to continue with some landscaping and possibly extending our wooden deck.  I will share pictures soon!

~Thank you for visiting!

Moving the Sheep

Hello everyone, it is that time of year when we start moving our sheep into a neighbouring pasture.  For several  years we have taken advantage of our neighbour's fields to provide our sheep with some additional pastures for grazing.  This helps to protect our pastures and also saves our neighbours the work of mowing their fields.  This is a relatively easy task as the entry to the field is directly across from our farm lane.  For our adult sheep this is always exciting in part because they know that when they cross into that pasture their will be grain waiting for them.  For our lambs though it is a little stressful as they have not yet figured out that when the gate is open they are supposed to follow their mommies!

So for the first few days we end up with our ewes and many lambs on in a pasture on one side of the road and some other lambs left behind at our farm.

The lambs that stay behind congregate at the fence and start bawling.

And bawling.

They are quite vocal.

And I must say surprisingly loud.  It only takes a few days for the lambs to learn that if they stay with the flock they will all end up together.   We only leave the sheep across the road for a few hours each day before bringing them back home again.

 While the lambs were embarrassing themselves I was busy in the garden with my assistant Chantalaria.  She is quite a grumpy cat but if the dogs are not out she likes to follow me.  Last weekend she followed me all the way to Lake Ophelia and we had to carry her back.  

I dont know what this it but it is blooming in various parts of the garden and lawn.

This unfortunately I know far too well.  Aegopodium is a dreadfully invasive plant that I received from the neighbouring farm many years ago.  Although I was warned that it was not well mannered I foolishly thought that it would be a great plant for the shady area under our large maples and for the first couple of years it seems that the transplants barely survived.  Now however it has spread aggressively and our attempts to eradicate it have failed.  This year I will be carefully forking it out and then covering the entire area with heavy black plastic to try to smother it.  Unfortunately it seems that there is no easy to way to get rid of it and once it takes hold the best one can hope for is to keep it to a minimum.  Dear fellow gardeners if you havent already had this experience please avoid the awful plant at all cost!

~Enjoy your week and thank you for visiting!~